


One’s Impossible, Two is Dreary (aka, There are 10 kinds of people in this world: those who understand binary, and those who don’t.)

by Lokei



Category: Glee
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen, Hummel family, M/M, Phone Calls & Telephones, Season/Series 05, You matter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-13
Updated: 2013-11-13
Packaged: 2018-01-01 10:20:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1043661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lokei/pseuds/Lokei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurt’s voice in his ear is warm and evens out all of the jagged edges on Blaine’s insides.  “I’m back early from Callbacks and wanted to make sure to respond to you before it got too late.  Care to explain this text?”</p><p>Ah.  Right.  About an hour ago, when Marley was in even more of a tailspin about Jake than she was about Mr. Schue, Blaine had given in to his own niggling insecurity and typed and sent ‘Are you sure you don’t mind I’m a Katy?’ before he’d really thought about it. He felt dumb about three seconds later: Kurt was no Jake Puckerman, plus Kurt was his fiance, plus the longer he thought about it the dumber this whole week’s assignment seemed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One’s Impossible, Two is Dreary (aka, There are 10 kinds of people in this world: those who understand binary, and those who don’t.)

**Author's Note:**

> Episode tag for "A Katy or a Gaga," because this episode made me tired.

Blaine’s at Marley’s house endeavoring to help Unique cheer her up when his phone rings. He looks up at them from his spot on the floor to where Unique is brushing Marley’s hair meditatively as Marley tries once more to figure out exactly what it was she did to deserve getting kicked out of glee for the week.

“I can call him back,” he offers, but Marley shakes her head and Unique smiles.

“You go answer your man.”

Blaine chuckles, but doesn’t go anywhere, just tilting his head back and closing his eyes as he thumbs the answer button.

“Kurt, hey.”

“Hey, sweetheart.” Kurt’s voice in his ear is warm and evens out all of the jagged edges on Blaine’s insides. “I’m back early from Callbacks and wanted to make sure to respond to you before it got too late. Care to explain this text?”

Ah. Right. About an hour ago, when Marley was in even more of a tailspin about Jake than she was about Mr. Schue, Blaine had given in to his own niggling insecurity and typed and sent ‘Are you sure you don’t mind I’m a Katy?’ before he’d really thought about it. He felt dumb about three seconds later: Kurt was no Jake Puckerman, plus Kurt was his fiance, plus the longer he thought about it the dumber this whole week’s assignment seemed, but Unique was begging for assistance with those remarkable wide eyes, and so Blaine never got around to sending Kurt an ‘ignore that last text’ follow-up.

“Oh, right. Um. Where to start?” Blaine hasn’t been able to really fill Kurt in on this week yet, so he tries to go back to the beginning with Throat Explosion and Tina’s mini-meltdown, and Mr. Schue’s assignment for the week.

There’s a long silence at the other end of the phone and Blaine brings his chin down and opens his eyes in case the signal’s been lost, but the call still seems to be going. “Kurt?”

“You know,” Kurt says slowly, “I wasn’t always terribly impressed with Mr. Schue’s teaching choices when I was there, but I think he’s actually gotten worse. Did he actually use the words ‘ambi-edge?’”

Blaine sighs. “Yeah, he did. I was impressed Unique didn’t slap him, but Artie sort of called him on it.”

In the background he hears Unique insist she’s graduating before she gets around to bitch-slapping all the teachers who’ve belittled her in her high school career, and half smiles. 

“I know we’ve been kind of avoiding talking about it,” he adds softly, “but I missed Finn this week. He wasn’t perfect, but he did make Mr. Schue stop and think about things sometimes, and he would have probably made this week slightly less weird.”

And, knowing Kurt probably doesn’t want to have to respond to that right now, Blaine goes on to tell Kurt the rest of it--Mr. Schue insisting they self-define as ‘a Katy’ or ‘a Gaga’ and then force themselves to take on the other role, Sam’s intensity even higher than usual because of his crazy infatuation with the non-nurse, and Marley’s double problems with Jake and with the assignment/suspension.

“And now Unique and I are here at Marley’s for a strategic cheering up session,” Blaine finishes. He can hear Kurt washing dishes or something at the other end of the phone--Kurt has a rule about washing his roommates’ dishes, namely that he won’t, ever, but he breaks it when he’s upset, because cleaning things makes him want to stab things less. Blaine thinks this is, on the whole, both a healthy response and very useful for gauging the level of his fiance’s sometimes volcanic emotions. He does, however, have to make sure Kurt’s still capable of speech.

“Kurt?”

“Can you put me on speakerphone, sweetheart?” Kurt says slowly. “I’d like to talk to Marley, but I think all three of you should hear, so you and Unique can back me up if you need to.”

“Of course.” Blaine thumbs the speaker button and lets Marley and Unique know Kurt wants their attention. Marley sits up and eyes the phone with what Blaine thinks is a hilarious amount of trepidation. Kurt’s just not that scary.

“Hi Marley,” Kurt’s voice doesn’t sound quite the way it does when he’s talking to Rachel or Santana, and definitely not the way he talks to Blaine, but there’s something familiar about it that niggles at Blaine as his boyfriend speaks. 

“I haven’t gotten to know you very well yet, but Blaine tells me you were nice to him when he wasn’t being particularly nice to himself, so that suggests you’re a really good person. So I want you to listen to what I’m saying, because it’s really important. Are you listening?”

Marley whispers a yes, then clears her throat and repeats herself in a stronger voice. Blaine gives her a thumbs up and gets a shaky smile in return.

“Good,” Kurt continues. “Because there are a couple of things that I need to say, and I’m probably going to sound angry about some of them, but it’s not about you. First, ‘Katy’ and ‘Gaga’ aren’t people, they’re brands. People are way more complicated than whatever Mr. Schue’s probably well-intentioned but incredibly closed-minded point was. Nobody’s all sweetness and light all the time, nobody’s always hanging out over the edge. This is just another false choice, and Mr. Schue’s always been really binary, so I’m not surprised, but I am disappointed.”

Blaine breaks in at that point. “Ryder did ask if there wasn’t a third option, but Mr. Schue ignored him.”

“Well that’s the nicest thing I’ve heard about Ryder in a while,” Kurt mutters. “But this is just another version of the ‘boys versus girls’ competitions, which were stereotypical even when he asked us to switch up the songs we were singing. ‘Or’ is not the only option. Everybody has days when they’re Glinda *and* when they’re Elphaba.”

Marley is starting to smile a little more fully and Blaine wants to kiss Kurt so badly right now, because he’s figured out why Kurt’s tone towards Marley sounds familiar. Kurt sounds like Burt, and Blaine is not at all surprised by what Kurt says next.

“And here’s the other really important thing. You are allowed to say ‘no,’ Marley. I think girls get that message in much weirder ways than guys do, but you are allowed to say no. And you’d think after all the insanity that went with when we tried to do Rocky Horror that Mr. Schue would remember that.”

Unique looks intrigued. “What happened?”

“Among other things, Finn wandering the halls in his tighty-whities, and Sam in really tiny gold lamé shorts.” Kurt snorts. “Which caused a bunch of trouble. Mr. Schue also wanted me to play Frankenfurter. I said no.”

“So who played Frankenfurter?” Unique presses.

“Mercedes,” Kurt sounds like he’s smiling over the phone, like he knows how Unique’s face has lit up at that. “She did a much better job than I would have felt comfortable even attempting, then.”

“Did you get in trouble for turning it down?” Marley asks.

“No. Which is why I think Mr. Schue’s being really unfair. You *can* say no. You’re in *high school,* Marley, and an adult man insisting you wear skimpy clothing and go outside your comfort zone isn’t just poor teaching, it’s borderline criminal behavior. Your voice matters. You matter. Whether it’s talking to your teachers or your friends or your boyfriend. You deserve to be heard, and for people to respect what you say.”

Blaine hides his humongous grin behind his hand and tucks his knees up to his chest to hide the fact that realizing that someday Kurt is going to be a *tremendously fabulous dad* is doing all kinds of things to his libido.

Marley’s sniffling, but smiling. “Thanks, Kurt. I see why Blaine’s totally sweet on you.”

Well, that’s one way to put it, if not completely the most accurate at the moment. Blaine chokes back another laugh.

“Kind of wish I’d said no, too,” he admits. “You really should have seen what Sam insisted I wear, Kurt.”

“You mean, the green and silver thing Tina emailed me a photo of earlier? I was hoping there was an explanation for that. That was Sam’s idea?”

“It certainly wasn’t mine!” Blaine protests, and now Unique and Marley are giggling and he wonders when he lost control of this conversation. Probably when he answered the phone.

“And are we *sure* that man is straight?” Kurt drawls, and now Blaine is laughing, too, squeaking a little on the inhale as he tries to catch his breath.

“No,” he giggles. “Less convinced all the time, in fact. But we need to take this off speaker before I’m embarrassed any further, I think,” Blaine says.

“One more thing first,” Kurt says. “If someone asked me now to play Frankenfurter, Marley, I’d probably still say no. But I’d think about it longer. And there are other parts I’d never thought I’d be willing to play in high school that look kind of fun now. And if you can be comfortable enough in yourself to know that a part you’re playing, or a costume you’re wearing, isn’t really about you, but just someone else’s story you’re borrowing for a while, that helps. It’s hard not to feel like you’re putting yourself up there for people to mock, and I really understand that. But sometimes being someone totally different from who you are can be fun, too. When, and if, you want to be.”

Marley takes the phone from Blaine’s loose grip, like Kurt will somehow know she means it more, or something. “Thank you, Kurt. I hope I can say ‘thank you’ some way that matters next time you’re in Ohio.”

Kurt’s voice is still so sweet, Blaine can barely stand it. 

“For future reference, I accept both ‘thank you’s’ and apologies in cookie format,” he jokes, and Marley laughs her first real laugh all week. Blaine takes the phone back and sidles out of the room to a knowing look from Unique. 

He holes up in the bathroom across the hall and makes sure the phone’s not on speaker any more.

“I want to kiss you so badly right now, Kurt Hummel,” he says, and Kurt chuckles.

“Is that right?”

“You are going to be so amazing with our kids someday,” Blaine replies, and hears Kurt’s breath catch.

“So will you.” Kurt’s voice is less kindly-warm and more darkly-heated and Blaine shifts on his seat on the edge of the tub, wondering if contemplating being a mid-thirties dad is a turn on to other people besides them, and if that makes him more a Katy or a Gaga in the eyes of the world. 

He doesn’t really care. Kurt’s his Beatles-singing, Vogue-writing, meerkat-slaying, warm-milk-drinking ridiculously complicated soulmate, and so long as he wants a nocturnal-avenging, bow-tie-wearing, Katy-Perry-singing, Malcolm-Gladwell-reading ridiculously complicated soulmate by his side, the rest of the world--and their either/or false binaries--can go jump.


End file.
